Turkish Warplanes Again Cross Border To Bomb in N. Iraq

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/26/AR2007122600210.html?sub=AR

Turkish Warplanes Again Cross Border To Bomb in N. Iraq

CAIRO, Dec. 26 -- Turkish warplanes on Wednesday bombed suspected Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq for at least the third time in the past 10 days, while the Bush administration urged Turkey to act with restraint in its intensified cross-border offensive against the guerrillas.
Turkey has expressed gratitude for U.S. intelligence assistance, which it characterized as invaluable in the attacks. However, some Iraqi leaders, particularly Iraqi Kurds, are angry at what they see as U.S. acquiescence to Turkey's violations of Iraqi territory.
Turkey's attacks on Turkish Kurd guerrillas operating out of northern Iraq have placed the United States in the middle of a dangerous struggle between two regional U.S. allies.
In Wednesday's attack, Turkish warplanes bombed eight caves or other suspected winter hideouts of Kurdish guerrillas in the Zap Valley, in Kurdish northern Iraq, the Turkish military general staff said in a statement on its Web site.
The Turkish statement called the bombing a "pinpoint operation." It gave no word of casualties.
Kurdish officials in northern Iraq said Turkish warplanes bombed near the border for about an hour Wednesday morning. The Kurdish officials said there were no injuries or deaths because the area was largely deserted.
A Kurdish regional security official in Iraq called on the U.S. and Iraqi governments to intervene to stop Turkey's attacks.
"Protecting the Iraqi borders is the government responsibility, and the American forces should protect the borders and airspace as well," said Jabbar Yawar, a spokesman for the pesh merga, the militia of the Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq. "The Turkish attacks are a brazen aggression. The Iraqi government did nothing to protect the Iraqi lands, even though it's their responsibility, and the Kurdish lands are part of Iraq."

Turkey has escalated air and ground attacks in northern Iraq since Dec. 16, when it sent warplanes across the border for hours of nighttime bombing.
Turkey is targeting bases in Iraq of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, known by its Kurdish initials PKK. The armed group has been fighting for a separate homeland for Kurds in Turkey since 1984.
Turkey claims it has "neutralized" at least 150 rebels in the 10 days and hit a number of PKK bases. Turkey has confirmed three separate days of airstrikes and one cross-border ground incursion; Iraqi Kurds claim Turkey has bombed across the border five times in the past 10 days.
The attacks follow a commitment by President Bush in November to increase U.S. intelligence-sharing and military cooperation with Turkey to help it fight the rebels. Turkish leaders and generals said U.S. intelligence helped Turkey identify targets for the Dec. 16 bombing runs.

Turkey's president on Wednesday praised the U.S. cooperation.
"Things are going on well at the moment. Intelligence is being shared" between the United States and Turkey, President Abdullah Gul told reporters in Ankara, the Turkish capital.
"Both of us are satisfied," Gul said of the United States and Turkey. "This is how it should be. We should have come to this point earlier."
But the Bush administration and the U.S. military fear that the attacks could destabilize northern Iraq, which has been one of the quietest areas in Iraq since the U.S. invasion. Kurds have been the most openly appreciative group in Iraq of the U.S. overthrow of President Saddam Hussein.
U.S. generals have worried that an escalated campaign against Turkish Kurd guerrillas in northern Iraq could cost the United States that oasis of calm, forcing the U.S. military to divert resources to the north and opening up American troops to revenge attacks there.
The United States has told Turkey of its concerns over the escalated offensive, a White House spokesman said Wednesday.
"We've also made it clear to the Turkish government that anything that could lead to escalated concerns or civilian casualties, we have concerns about those steps," White House spokesman Scott Stanzel told reporters aboard Air Force One en route to Texas with Bush.
But Stanzel said U.S. assistance against the Kurdish guerrillas would continue.
"The PKK is a terrorist organization," Stanzel said. "The Iraqis don't want terrorists in their country, and the PKK is a destabilizing force in the northern part of Iraq. So we continue to work collaboratively, both with Iraq and Turkey, on these issues."
Philip T. Reeker, a spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, repeated Wednesday the American position that the PKK is the "common enemy" of Turkey, Iraq and the United States. "At the same time," Reeker said, "we continue to urge that no one should do anything to destabilize the north."

U.S. officials in Baghdad said they could not reconcile the large disparity between the casualty figures for northern Iraq provided by Turkey and the repeated insistence by Iraqi officials that the bombing raids had caused little damage because they occurred in areas that civilians had fled.
"These are Turkish decisions and Turkish actions," Maj. Gen. Kevin J. Bergner, a U.S. military spokesman, told reporters in Baghdad. "We don't have forces there that are the arbiters of ground truth."
Turkey's military also is battling Kurdish guerrillas within Turkey, killing six and capturing two Wednesday in what the military described as a "clash" on Mount Kupeli in the southeastern province of Sirnak. Turkish armed forces said they "neutralized" five other guerrillas on the mountain on Tuesday.
Turkey's general staff said the fighting was in an area where guerrillas killed four Turkish soldiers in November.
Partlow reported from Baghdad. Special correspondent Dlovan Brwari in Mosul, Iraq, contributed to this report.